Startup Of The Week: Chummy

Meet Anton Zapolskyi, Vitalii Betin and John Popel, key people behind Chummy, the simplest app to ask for help and pay it forward.

I connected with Chummy co-founders to talk about social responsibility, human kindness and startup life.

Tomas Laurinavicius: What’s your elevator pitch?

Chummy is the simplest way to ask for help and pay it forward. You open the mobile app, post what you need help with on the map, respond to others’ needs, and earn Thank-You tokens for being a reliable chum in your area. The more people you help, the more likely it is you will receive help when you need it.

1. In modern cities, people face daily problems alone. Gone are the days when people borrowed a cup of sugar from the neighbor or shared a cold beer with a thirsty stranger.

2. 6/10 Americans gravitate toward paying it forward and helping like-minded people. The issue is there’s been no way to identify the kind, like-minded fellows in the city. There’s been no safe and fun tool for engaging in daily random acts of kindness.

3. Even having hundreds of virtual “friends,” people feel the lack of real chums who matter and on whom they can rely. The “friends” we make online nowadays are often inauthentic and have no value in real life.

4. Since our childhood, things like scouting and Marvel/DC superheroes have stoked our craving to become real superheroes in our home city. Too bad there’s been no way to make that happen.

Laurinavicius:How did you get initial traction?

Very early on, the founders asked their friends to use the app, and then the friends of their friends, etc. At the same time what they were trying out was our Facebook SMM channel. For this year of open beta testing, we relied on viral growth while embedding the InviteChums in-app function. When people get help from real people it inspires a lot, triggering a wow-effect and a willingness to share the app with others.